The holidays are a great opportunity to slow down and spend some time with your kids doing fun holiday activities together. Check out this list of ideas for inspiration!
Bake Treats to Give to Neighbors
If you’re looking for things to do as a family at Christmas, baking treats to give to neighbors is a great way to spend quality time with your kids and teach them to reach out to others in your community. After baking your favorite Christmas treats, you can plate them up, load them up in a wagon, and go door to door passing them out. If your kids enjoy singing, do some good old-fashioned Christmas caroling at each door, to make it extra special for your neighbors.
Drive Around to See Christmas Lights
Want to make some memories as a family this holiday season? There’s nothing better than driving slowly through neighborhoods and looking at everyone’s Christmas lights display. Make sure you tune into a festive radio station and of course, don’t forget the hot chocolate!
Watch a Christmas Movie
Watching a Christmas movie is another great Christmas activity you could do with your kids. There are so many great movie options to choose from, but here are some of our favorites:
- A Charlie Brown Christmas
- White Christmas
- Noelle
- The Christmas Miracle of Jonathan Toomey
- The Star
- Christmas With The Chosen
- VeggieTales The Best Christmas Gift
- VeggieTales: The Toy That Saved Christmas
- The Very First Noel
Make Cards for Children’s Hospital Patients
A Christmas activity doesn’t have to just be memorable, it can also be meaningful. Teach your kids to think of others this year and have them make cards for children’s hospital patients. You can give them to a nurse to distribute or ask if you can pass them out yourself.
Visit a Nursing Home and Sing Christmas Carols to Residents
Another great Christmas activity you can do with your kids is to visit a nursing home to sing Christmas carols to residents. Nursing and retirement home residents are often forgotten and neglected around the holidays and they can get incredibly lonely. Bringing the festivities to them and brightening their day with a Christmas carol or two can have more of an impact than you may think, and again, helps your children shift their focus outward.
Have a Gingerbread House Decorating Contest
If you’re looking for fun things to do as a family at Christmas, how about some friendly competition? Get some gingerbread house kits and have a decorating contest, complete with judges and prizes! Your kids will love using their creativity to create the perfect gingerbread house. You can do boys vs. girls with mom and dad as the judge, or mom’s team vs. dad’s team and have grandparents judge!
Decorate the Tree
Some parents see decorating the tree as an art form and cringe at the thought of letting their kids help out with this potentially messy and stressful task. But if you lay everything out ahead of time and give everyone a task, your kids (and you) can enjoy decorating the tree together. It is one of the most special holiday activities you can do together. Reminiscing about the ornaments as you carefully hook each one, seeing the joy on your children’s faces when you finally plug in the lights–these are moments that are well worth the effort.